


Standards

by ruff_ethereal



Series: Two To Get In Trouble [4]
Category: Descendants (2015)
Genre: Abusive Relationships, F/M, Gen, Major Original Character(s), Non-Explicit Sex, Original Character-centric, Verbal Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-31
Updated: 2016-01-31
Packaged: 2018-05-17 07:50:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5860423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruff_ethereal/pseuds/ruff_ethereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A tale about a man, his friend, and the relationship he should not have gotten into.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Standards

**Author's Note:**

  * For [magenta_sunrise](https://archiveofourown.org/users/magenta_sunrise/gifts).



The bar they were in was literally a hole in the wall, carved out of the side of some long abandoned warehouse its owner had forgotten about it, left to rot, or had died in some fashion long ago; it was not his ideal location for the hunt, but his partner was insistent that they'd have much better luck here than they did in the marketplace.

They were at a table made of old driftwood, part of a broken ship mast, and a broken wagon wheel covered with plywood. Two chipped, cracked, or outright broken mugs of watered down swill balanced precariously on the surface, ones they had only bought so the bartender couldn't accuse them of loitering, and they didn't drink because they knew that taking even a single sip of it would be very bad for their taste buds and their health, along with doing a poor job of actually making them drunk. He sat on a chair made of a somewhat sturdy barrel, rotten and old with age and too much seawater, while his partner perched himself on some driftwood logs with an old fishing net draped on them for a seat, a hand on the table both to spread out his sizable weight and prevent the chair from collapsing, and keep their mugs from overbalancing the plywood and sending them to the floor.

He sat back while his friend's sharp eyes watched for movements and figures in the dim light, silently assessing them. Then, he stopped, canted his head to him, and pointed out his mark. 

“What about her?” He asked.

He looked. She was very different from most women he’d seen on the Isle of the Lost. If it weren’t for her distinctly feminine features, he would have mistaken her for a man for all of the muscle. What he would not have gotten wrong, however, was that she was most definitely a fighter, with numerous scars visible in the dim light and many more he couldn’t see underneath her much patched-and-stitched shirt.

He balked. “I thought we were looking for a _lover_ , not an _executioner._ ”

“Aw, come on, won’t you give her a shot? She might have a soft spot for brainy types like you.”

He sighed. “Yes, I'd assume she rather enjoys stuffing men like me into barrels and crates, hanging me off hooks before using me as a punching bag, or seeing how far she can throw me.” He deadpanned.

His friend sighed. “You know what I mean. Just because she has a rough, dangerous exterior doesn’t mean that her interior is just as bad. Look at me.” He gestured to himself.

He gave him a withering look. “Oh, and you're supposed to be fantastic example? If I remember right, it took you quite a long time before you discovered your gentler side.”

And bodies, and blood, and ruined lives, but they didn’t talk about that.

His friend raised his hand. “Alright, fine. But my point still stands, you should still try and find out.”

He shook his head. “She's most definitely not my ‘type,' with or without comparison to everyone else you’ve tried to ‘hook me up’ with. And speaking of which—why is it never _you_ that does the introducing?”

His friend shook his head. “Ruins the point. If I were a slightly less attractive version of you, that’d be perfect, but...” He silently gestured at the drastic differences between the two of them.

His friend: tall, muscular, and lean, a fighter, an athlete, a dashing figure even with the simple shirt and pants combination he wore. The patches, the suspiciously grouped holes, and the stitches on his clothes added to his allure, and the numerous scars he had was an attractive feature all on its own. More than one woman had been _very_ interested in him, wondering exactly who he was, how he had gotten that way, and how they could get him to show them the rest.

And he: short, frail, and to be honest, more than a little pudgy, an intellectual, a scientist, the caricature of men with foggy glasses, hunched over postures, and white lab coats come to life. The stains on his clothing—grease, oil, rust, and unidentifiable stains from all manner of sources—only made people stay away, with no one but the most morbidly curious wondering about where he got them. And for him, women tended to treat him as if he was completely invisible, or not bothered at all, knowing that whatever they didn’t know about him would probably be just as interesting as the rest.

His friend started scanning the bar again. “So, any progress on figuring out what's your type?”

He shook his head. “Data is still insufficient. Not to mention it’s a horribly subjective thing prone to changing.”

“Come on, you've got to have some idea of what kind of woman you'd like by now! What's the most attractive trait for you? When you picture your ideal woman in your mind, what do you see?”

And just before he was going to answer him, she entered.

She didn't walk in through the double doors so much as she slammed them open, rusty hinges creaking and whining before they ripped off the walls entirely, the plywood and scrap panes crashing to the ground. All eyes were suddenly on her, and no matter the expressions on their faces, she lavished in the attention.

She strutted in like a queen, head held up high, posture perfect, each stride sure and long. She had a lithe figure, her body wrapped up in a luxurious fur coat, once pure as snow, but still striking even now that it was a dirty off-white. She had an aura about her, oozing self-confidence from every pore, seemingly glowing in the din.

He watched as she slid into a seat at the bar, and raised a dainty finger. “Darling, a glass of your finest liquor, on the double.” She said, before she rested her hands on her lap.

The bartender in particular wasn't pleased with the destruction of their property, having to serve her, or her blatant, casual disregard of her offenses to them and their establishment, but they still poured her a glass of scotch, undiluted. They knew who she was, and they knew that if they rose hell or even so much as said a peep, it would only lead to hell and damnation, a splitting headache and bleeding ears, and the doors would still be broken.

Unfortunately for him, he did not know who she was.

“Someone like that...” He mumbled, his attention firmly locked on Cruella.

He didn’t see the look on his friend's face turn to that of pure, indescribable horror. “No. Please, whatever you do, _don't.”_

He frowned and turned to him. “Why? What's the problem?”

“ Have you  _ seriously  _ never heard of Cruella de Vil? I didn't even come from London, or even her  _ century _ , and  _ I  _ know her! You know the 101 Dalmatians incident?”

“Vaguely. The news had a real kerfuffle over some massive litter of dogs. Was she the breeder?”

“She was the one that wanted to kidnap 99 innocent puppies, skin them, and turn them into a new fur coat.”

“Ah.” He replied calmly.

His friend stared at him.

“I was never much for animals.” He explained as he got up. “Wish me luck.” He said as he laid down some of his share of money and valuables on the table.

His friend tried to warn him, but the glitter of semi-precious metals and goods brought the thieves out of the woodwork, urchins and vertically challenged adult criminals scurrying and lurking underneath the tables. With his friend busy fighting them off with one hand while he tried to keep the table balanced with the other, he was free to fix his hair, clean his glasses a little on his coat, and mentally prepare his introduction before he slid into the seat next to Cruella.

She didn’t look at him as he did, instead taking a drink from her scotch. He couldn't help but notice the lipstick mark on the rim of the glass as she set it back down, and found himself having a fleeting fit of jealousy over it. 

“I was wondering if you were going to man up and come over.” Cruella hummed as she looked him over with a neutral expression.

He blushed, the cool, confident aura he had gained suddenly shattered. “Err… you noticed?”

She shot him a look. “Darling, when you've been in the spotlight as much as I have, you get a keen sixth sense on whose eyes are watching you. And yours were rather intent on taking in _moi_.”

He chuckled awkwardly. “It would be surprising if I didn't, considering how positively _stunning_ you are tonight.”

Cruella blinked, surprised, before her lips slowly spread out in a smile. To others, it looked a little _too_ predatory, like a tiger about to kill and eat you, but to him, it was more like a mischievous cat's, wondering if this new creature was worth the trouble.

“ Forgive my surprise, I've been dwelling in this sordid pit for so long, I've started to think that there wasn't anyone with any good taste left.”  She said . “Heavens knows you can't get anything half-decent around these parts.” She said, casting a disdainful glance at her scotch.

“I know what you mean.” He said. “It used to be that I had access to the most cutting edge of technologies, the best materials, chased after and fought by every last university, corporation, or government institution under the sun, pushing the boundaries of science as we knew it… now I'm busy figuring out whether to stick a fork inside a machine made out of an old toaster, or just apply more duct tape and pray for the best.”

Cruella looked at him with renewed interest. “Handyman, are you?”

He winced. “I prefer the term 'inventor,' 'scientist,' or 'doctor.' A 'handyman' merely fixes things; I do that, _and_ figure out how to make them better.”

“A scientist, then! Did you ever work with machines?”

“ They were my lifeblood.” He introduced himself,  with his name, and a condensed version his reputation before the Great Uniting and the Banishment shorty after,  along with  the degrees he had held. “…  Now they're just  no more than pieces of paper. I sorely wished I hadn't specialized so much in instruments of death—mostly equipment for slaughterhouses, sometimes security systems of the 'serious injury' to 'lethal' variety for private contractors, and the occasional implement of torture.” He sighed. “The Auradonian constitution  has  some  _ very  _ far-reaching, vague definitions as to what exactly is a 'villain.'”

Cruella's face soured. “Ugh, exactly like that King Beast to be so narrow-minded and dense with his 'ideals' and 'goodness.' If I had met you before this rash of horrific bad luck, I'd have hired you on the spot, make me a machine that could skin animals better and faster than any human could! Did you know they used to be so proud to tell me the beasts were skinned by hand, as if I'd be pleased to know that someone with a flair for knives spent the better part of an hour with one animal than a machine processing them one after the other? And don't even get me started on all the kerfuffle the 'activists' raised, about how it would be 'inhumane' to make such a thing—as if animals are better for anything than for furs and food!”

That should have been his first warning. Instead, he nodded his head.

“Tradition and stubborn men who can't accept they're obsolete are one of the biggest enemies of progress, yes. I’m sure I could have made you such a machine then, but I'm afraid it's something of a moot point now—no materials, no proper laboratory, and the animals here are probably more likely to hunt us, than we hunt them.

“Though if you need a contraption made or jury-rigged for mundane chores, or a security system to protect your belongings, I can help you with that.”

Cruella leaned in. “Pray tell what chores, exactly?”

“ Depends:  what's the job and  can you get me the parts I need?”  He smiled. “There are few problems I can’t build a machine to solve, I assure you.”

She hummed. “A very bold claim—I like that… you know, I could really use a man like you around the mansion.”

“It’d be my pleasure to help. Unfortunately, I can't exactly work for free, what with the Isle being what it is.”

Cruella casually let her coat part in the middle, showing off the aged, wrinkled, but still form-fitting dress underneath. “I'm sure we can work out some form of payment. If you'd like, we can discuss them tonight—maybe some place more comfortable, like my home?” She batted her eyelashes at him.

“Let’s.”

“Walk me to my car, darling?” Cruella asked as she offered her arm.

“It would be my pleasure.” He said as he took it.

They made a strange sight that turned heads, such a tall and lithe woman in a luxurious fur coat and such a small and dumpy man like him in a filthy lab coat, but he didn't mind, and no one said anything.

Little did he know that they didn't want to pull him away from Cruella's grasp so they wouldn't miss out on a fantastic story in the future.

* * *

Their time together was a dark, dizzying merry-go-round, full of ups and downs, twists and turns, sudden jerks that threw him every which way, and that was only when Cruella was driving them back to Hell Hall.

He had tried to tell her to slow down, but she couldn’t hear him over the roar of the engine or her own mad cackling as she tore through the pot-hole filled streets of the Isle of the Lost. He tried pulling on his seatbelt but all of they were gone on that side, ripped off by damage or some accident long ago, forcing him to grab onto anything just to try keep himself steady—emphasis on “try.”

Eventually, however, the ride stopped, with Cruella not so much pulling into her driveway so much as sending her car swerving and spinning, leaving skidmarks and a quarter-mile long groove in the dirt before it came to a stop right in front of her door. 

He was thrown into the passenger side door as the car tilted sideways from the momentum. It threw itself wide open thanks to a broken latch, and he ended up falling into a faceful of hard-packed dirt.

“Get up, darling!” Cruella hummed as she killed the engine. “Much as I’m sure you want to get right to our negotiations, I simply _will_ not do them out here in the cold when I could be nice and warm inside.”

He picked himself up and watched as she strode past him and up the steps into Hell Hall. He had to stand before it for a moment, slowly turning his head up and taking it all in. In the gloomy night, cloudy night, it looked like a crooked, menacing, giant, all sharp claws, ugly teeth, and cavernous maws, the darkest nightmares of London's architects come to life.

He couldn’t help but shudder.

“Make sure to lock my car before you enter, darling!” Cruella called from inside. “There’s never been a shortage of hoodlums who want to take it for themselves…” She growled.

He thought of pointing out that the rest of the Isle had long abandoned what few cars they’d smuggled in and exchanged them for the much more practical rickshaw, given the lack of proper parts, the difficulty of finding a mechanic or even tools to maintain it with, and the unpleasant consequences of using biofuel, but he decided against it.

He locked and closed the passenger side door, the locking mechanism stuck and would barely budge; he made a note to fix it as he made his way inside. 

Time had not been particularly kind to Hell Hall. There was a thick layer of dust everywhere, moth-eaten sheets thrown over the furniture in an attempt to preserve them, along with more than a couple of holes, broken down walls, and waterlogged areas sagging from the weight. Once upon a time, it would have been a grand sight to see, the chandelier and the candelabras alight, every surface and decoration absolutely spotless and gleaming while the mistress of the house strutted about entertaining guests with the aid of a small army of servants. Now, the only illumination was from moonlight the pouring in from the holes in the roof, dust and cobwebs covered almost every last available surface, and Cruella was the only soul left.

“In here, darling!” She called from further in. “Don’t keep me _waiting!”_

He followed her voice to one of the few open doors. He figured the room had been a parlor once, where Cruella received her guests, effortlessly wiling, wooing, and charming them while they were served sweetmeats and fine liquors; now, it was where she lounged on an old chaise lounge, dust still floating in the air from when she’d pulled off the sheet covering it—he could even see it bunched up just behind the seat.

However decrepit and dirty her surroundings were, however, Cruella still looked beautiful. Perhaps this was what drove the masses to flock and fawn to celebrities so much, that undeniable aura of confidence and power they exuded, one made them seem to be glowing.

“Have a seat, darling,” she purred.

He looked around. There were a few armchairs about, but they were all covered with more moth-eaten and dusty sheets.

Cruella laughed, before a sly smile spread on her lips as she patted the spot next to her.

He blushed. “Ah.” He awkwardly made his way to her and sat down. In the privacy of her parlor than in the grimy public of the bar, he was much, _much_ more aware of just how close they were.

“I’m afraid I can’t offer you anything in the way of refreshments, darling.”

“That’s fine,” he replied. “I was always for going straight to negotiations.”

Cruella chuckled. “Well let’s get started then.”

Without warning, she grabbed him by the lapels and pulled him in.

He had never really been that much interested in sex for all of his years. His lack of attractive features; the tendency for the world to either ignore him or ruthlessly prey on him; and the demands of higher education, academe, and work had pretty much ensured that he never would have even thought of looking for a woman. It was only at his friend’s insistence that he had even agreed to try to go out and meet women.

But now, he was learning all that he had missed out on. He bothered by all the “wasted years”--there were definitely much better experiences than sex—but winning a contract with a six-figure advance, recognition from the top institutions in the world, or receiving his copy of his newest patent in the mail were pleasures of the past, and this was now.

And for however intimidating and unattractive Cruella was to certain persons, he could not deny that she knew what to do to please a man, leave him flat on his back, exhausted, satisfied and enjoying their afterglow. 

Before he fell asleep, he watched Cruella sitting on the side, still naked and lighting up a cigarette—a rather pleasant sight.

He woke up to Cruella screaming—a decidedly _much_ less pleasant experience.

“ **JASPER! HORACE! BREAKFAST, _NOW!”_**

If he had to describe the sound, it would be the mythical harpies brought to life, a horrible screeching beyond human comprehension, one that ruptured his ear drums, made it feel like he was bleeding right out of the sides of his head, with the noise still echoing inside his head long after it had faded away, like millions of resonating needles jabbed deep into his brain.

She kept on screaming, promising no shortage of admonishment, punishment, and general verbal abuse until two men—Horace and Jasper, he presumed—burst into the parlor, doing a tug of war with a tray of rotten fruit, stale bread, and some poorly brewed coffee that had already managed to spill half-empty.

He took the opportunity to dress himself and make himself decent, but he was about the last concern on anyone’s mind. He watched from the doorway as Cruella mercilessly ripped into Horace and Jasper, a verbal assault that would have brought lesser men to their knees with tears in their eyes and pathetic whimpers in their throats, but it would seem that Horace and Jasper were either a cut above the rest or had been put down so low and so often, it just wasn’t possible for Cruella to make them feel any worse about themselves.

Much as he wanted to leave, shut the door behind him and not have to hear (most) of her admonitions, he considered himself too much of a gentleman to simply sneak out the morning after—though his sense of honour was quickly becoming less and less valuable than his continued ability to hear.

Fortunately for everyone, Cruella ran out of steam, or decided that hunger was a more compelling urge than more screeching at Horace and Jasper. The two men retreated with their heads bowed and their eyes glaring at each other, silently blaming the other for their predicament. They looked at him in a mix of pity, relief, and cruel enjoyment, but they disappeared before he could really make anything of it.

“Buffoons, then and now…” Cruella grumbled before she took a bite out of a long-spoiled apple, one that had been bitten into already. 

Her mood  improved after  breakfast . Not by much, but it was still better than the  burning  rage she was in just moments ago. “So sorry about that, darling; you would not believe how  difficult it is sometimes, being forced to work with those oafs, and knowing they really are the best help I can get .”

He nodded, still reeling from the shock of the assault.

“And speaking of help: there was the matter of your fixing my car for me, yes?” She smiled. “I do believe I’ve already paid in full, but I’ll be amenable to a generous bonus for good, swift work…” She winked.

He blushed and nodded. “Right away. Do you mind if I have your men go searching for parts for me?”

“Do whatever you think is necessary. Though I must warn you: don’t expect them to come back with exactly what you want, and if they do, it probably won't be in one piece.”

He nodded. “I’ll manage.”

He spent a good portion of the morning examining Cruella’s car, looking under the hood and its chassis, assessing what exactly he needed to do to it. To say the least, it would have been easier to list all the things that _didn’t_ need repair, jury-rigging, or total replacement.

It was a testament to the original manufacturer's quality control and/or just plain luck that the just the engine had lasted as long as it did with the speeds and the abuse Cruella subjected it to. Without any gasoline on the Isle, she’d been fueling it with biofuel, leaving a giant mess in its pipes of leftover residue, buildup of organic matters, and this wasn’t even getting into the smell. 

And the passenger side door had only gotten even more stuck since last night.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do…” He muttered as he mentally listed the number of parts and tools he needed, a collection that grew exponentially with each passing second. _‘No matter,’_ he thought to himself as he returned to Hell Hall. _‘I won’t be the one looking for parts.’_

He found Horace and Jasper lounging in the kitchen, trying to build themselves sandwiches on stale bread, constantly sabotaging both their efforts by fighting for the (relatively) good ingredients and stealing them off the other, more often than not tearing them up or ruining it for the both of them.

He clapped his hands, the two stopped in the middle of fighting for a scrap of old, greasy cold cut meat. “You two: go down to the docks, and grab whatever you can find that’s mechanical—kitchen appliances, broken toys, and everything that looks like it must have come from a car.”

Horace glared at him. “You’re not the boss of us.”

“Yeah, who died and made you Cruella?” Jasper added as he tugged at the meat, wrenching it free from Horace's gasp.

He kept himself from sighed as Horace quickly tried to get it back while Jasper shielded it from him. “Cruella hired me to fix her car, among other jobs—and she said do whatever I deem is necessary, which means you two are helping.”

Horace paused with one long arm trying to reach over Jasper's shoulder and to the meat he held to his chest. “Seriously? How much is she paying you?”

He blushed and looked away. The two men stopped their tug-of-war, temporarily stunned by the realization. Then, they shook their heads.

That should have been his second warning, but again, he dismissed it.

“How she pays for my services is none of your business,” he said. “What _is_ is that you get those parts before Cruella comes asking and expecting that the job is already done.”

The two of them paled and quickly finished assembling their sandwiches with whatever they could grab. He smiled, happy that he'd gotten them to work; they were far from the caliber of assistants and partners he was used to working with, but as his old professor said, “You use the tools you are given and find a way to make them work, not complain and carp that they're not good enough and never get anything done.”

“You think we should warn him?” He heard Jasper whisper as they left.

“And what are we going to get out of it?”

“Right.”

He ignored the two of them and got to exploring Hell Hall for anything he could use. The good news was that Cruella had a full set of proper tools—a rarity on the island, and a blessing. The bad news was that Horace and Jasper had obviously been through the entire collection, used them for all manner of inane jobs and tasks, and did a terrible job of maintaining them after they were done.

Still, it was nothing a little extra work and some clever thinking couldn't solve. He gathered all the tools he was going to need in a box, and set off.

By the end of it, the car was roaring like a tiger and moving even faster. Only a professional job with proper, brand-new parts could have been better, and those were in very short supply here on the Isle of the Lost. He watched with pride—and from the safety of inside the door to Hell Hall—as Cruella drove laps around her home, leaving skid-marks, upturned dirt, and more than a couple of plumes of smoke and fire as she gunned the engine as hard as it could while making great use of the new turbo function.

The car screeched to a halt in front of the mansion, lurching forward dramatically, its back wheels flying up into the air before the weights sent it back down to the ground with barely any shock. He waited a few minutes inside before he decided it was safe enough to venture outside.

There was a wide, wide smile on her face and a sparkle in her eyes as Cruella stepped out of the car to meet him. He thought it was “glee,” others would have called it “mania.” 

“Do you like what I've done?” He asked, forcing a neutral expression.

“I _love_ it.” Cruella swooned. “Trust me, darling, you've earned your reward and then some. But for now, I must head into town to go shopping; heaven knows I can't trust those two with anything more valuable than their hides.” She smiled. “Want a ride?”

“I'd be honoured.” He said. 

The passenger side door opened smooth as it was the day it rolled off the factory floor—about the only thing that was pleasant about the whole ride back into town.

* * *

If Cruella was reckless and dangerous when she drove last night, the new and improved car made her anarchy on wheels, causing widespread wherever she went and leaving massive ruin in her wake. Rickshaws just couldn't move fast enough, especially one poor fool who was trapped between two long sections of building in a narrow street with no alleys to duck into. Stalls were destroyed and run over with impunity, be they wooden ones and laid out on blankets, their products of rotting fruit, cheap trinkets of glue, scrap, and tape, and stolen goods all taking to the air. And many poor pedestrians trying to get through their day learned of the surprising level of athletic and acrobatic skill they could summon in case of emergency—and many more wished they had it.

Before the Great Uniting, he had almost always never stuck around past the test phases, or the public unveiling of his creations. He had never really seen any of his works in their day to day business, observed what they could do once it was out of the lab and out on the field, and now he was beginning to understand why King Beast and the Aurodonian courts considered him a 'villain.'

Cruella didn't slide to a stop this time so much as she slammed on the brakes, bringing it from 80 to zero in seconds, and his head to the dashboard much faster. Too late, he realized he should have manufactured _two_ air bags and used some parts for a seatbelt and not for the engine.

He grasped for the door, missed several times, and tumbled out of the car as it swung out. The whole world spun, his head throbbed and pounded, and his empty stomach felt like purging itself of anything it could in lieu of food.

“Tata, darling! You'll be hearing from me again very soon, I assure you!” Cruella said before she roared off again, literally leaving him in the dust.

He got up and didn't bother brushing himself off, instead staggering back in the direction of his home. Fortunately, the pickpockets and muggers decided he was not a target with anything valuable, and the rest of the people were quite wary of getting even near him, in case Cruella would come roaring back for him.

His friend was waiting for him inside when he got back. He knew because the incredibly complex, very large, and extremely dangerous security system on one side of his house had been disabled, tripped, or deftly avoided, and he was the only person in the entire Isle who was both capable of doing so, and had a damn good reason to do it.

He found him lounging on the one window of his workshop, one leg idly swinging off the ledge, the other pressed up against the side.

“Happy to see you made it back in one piece! I was worried you weren't going to be able to escape Hell Hall.”

“Why would I have wanted to escape?” He asked.

His friend looked at him in confusion. “Because you were with _Cruella de Vil_?”

He shook his head. “You needn't have worry. If she had any intentions towards me, it wasn't to kill me.” He smiled.

His friend's eyebrows rose, before he shuddered in revulsion. “Seriously…?” He asked.

“Yes. I'd thought you'd be happier about this—you accomplished what you set out to do, didn't you?”

“Yeah, but not with _her!_ I was thinking more a nice or just half-way decent woman, maybe a quiet, peaceful type like you to keep you company and read books with on quiet nights, not _Cruella de Vil!”_

“And what _exactly_ is wrong with her?”

His friend rolled his eyes. “I could list so many reasons, but I'm just going to give you one: you can do so much better than this. Aren't you the one who's always chasing after the next big improvement? Didn't you say were never being satisfied with 'just good enough'?”

“That ethic assumes that it is possible for me to do better.”

His friend opened his mouth to speak, before he shut it and frowned. “You know, it's times like this that I regret that really smart people like you can be so very stupid sometimes.”

His friend climbed out of the window and out of his home. He made a note to reset his traps and weld bars onto that window, among other improvements to the security system.

That was the end of their conversations about Cruella. And as the weeks passed, he found that he really couldn't understand what his friend was so concerned about.

Sure, Cruella was loud, there were few measures she wouldn't use in abusing and harassing people, but she was never screaming or angry at _him_ , and he learned to bring a rather thick pair of earmuffs for whenever he was staying overnight.

She was also rather good conversation, if you knew what topics to speak of. For all the stereotypes that those in the fashion world could only ever talk about the latest trends, who's who, and what other people were wearing, Cruella was actually quite educated, well-read, and a great speaker, at that.

And the sex was fantastic, even better when he found himself improving. He was no experienced lover, but he was a quick learner and he had excellent control over his hands. Cruella was a living, breathing human being, not a machine with parts he could easily remove, study, or and put back together in a more effective configuration, but he could figure her out all the same given enough time and room to experiment.

There was a constant nagging in his brain that she was only using him for his ability to make and maintain machines, but he reasoned that there were other relationships had started for less than noble intentions and eventually turned into real affection. And however skeptical his friend was about it, Cruella was growing very fond of him.

Then, about less than a year in, the honeymoon finally ended.

The change was slow, but inevitable. There were only so many contraptions he could build, so many parts he could find on the isle, so many improvements he could make with the materials and the tools he had on hand—and if there was one thing Cruella had proven to him in their time together, it was that she always, always, _always_ wanted better than the best.

Work and life was catching up on him, too, as time spent working on Cruella's projects in exchange for sex was time taken from working on projects in exchange for money, valuables, and food, instead. And it was _really_ rather difficult to desire for intimacy when his stomach desired sustenance.

Most of all, things had become _boring_. 

First, there was his work ethic. Before the Great Uniting, he had never stayed on any project for very long and was always a contractual worker because his mind could never just stick to the one accomplishment or organization and be proud of that; he always had to be moving onto the next one, leaving just enough documentation and trained apprentices, coworkers, and partners to take over for him. Now in the Isle of the Lost, he trained Horace and Jasper, and while they were no college graduates, skilled engineers, or even just mechanically adept, he could teach them how to make basic, routine repairs all the same, and even managed to delegate some of the more unsavoury repairs to them.

Second, there was their running out of interesting things to talk about. After exhausting every last topic from their lives before the banishment, they found that all they could discuss was the nitty gritty of his work—something Cruella found dreadfully boring—or her latest round of complaints and bemoaning her fate to rot in the Isle—something he found he could only listen to so much of before he tuned it out completely, and mechanically patted her on the back.

And third and final, Cruella had run out of use for him and he for her, too. Once the gains had plateaued, she ceased putting as much effort into pleasing him both in the bedroom and outside of it, and he was starting to realize that for however much the rest of the male race ravenously chased after woman and sex, it was just not for him.

He had planned to be a gentleman and break it off with her gently—Cruella was still a woman, after all. 

But the relationship came to its own demise before he could act on it.

It started with shouting—not Cruella, but Horace and Jasper. It had been three weeks since he had last heard from any of them, and from the way the two of them got as close to the safety line as possible, shouting at the top of their lungs while they flailed their arms in the air, he figured that whatever had happened was a real emergency.

He asked them what the problem was, but all he got was unintelligible blubbering mixed with constantly blaming the other for it, so he boarded a rickshaw, Horace and Jasper pulling it themselves as fast as they could to Hell Hall.

He found Cruella in her parlor, weeping dramatically on the arm of the same chaise lounge so many months ago. “Darling!” She cried. “It's simply terrible—my-my baby--”

He frowned. “Your baby...?”

“My baby won't start!” She wailed, before she broke into another round of sobbing. “I simply _don't know_ what's wrong with it! No matter how many times I turn the ignition, it simply won't run, or even make a peep! It all started when these two oafs assured me they could handle its monthly checkup for you...” She said as she cast a glare at Horace and Jasper.

The two of them didn't seem to notice, already exhausted or passed out on the side, and neither was he about to stick around to listen to how the problem came to when he could have been solving it.

He propped open the hood, and found a nightmare inside. True, Cruella's car was already a hodgepodge of spare parts, re-purposed materials and devices, and more than a couple of completely original inventions of his make, but at least then, it all made sense, and was just a little dirty. But now the whole thing was a huge, black, oily, tarry mess, splattered with chewing gum, duct tape, rubber bands, tools left forgotten inside, along with spare parts, and large chunks of uncleaned debris. 

And as if to crown the whole disaster, there was a rotting lettuce and spoiled ham on stale bread sandwich on top of it.

His mind raced at the sheer number of parts, the potential problems, and all the different solutions that most definitely wouldn't work, until he stopped it, focused on one specific section, and got to work.

It had all actually gone really well. Not _easy,_ by any means, but he was able to undo the worst of the damage, and figure out how to repair or completely replace the systems Horace and Jasper had bungled up. The optional things like the turbo had to be ripped apart completely, and a number of the general improvements he had made had to be cannibalized to even try to get the engine to start working again, but eventually he got the car back to working condition, somewhere around the level it was before he had laid hands on it the first time.

He had to fetch Cruella to see if all his work had done the trick—she was the only one with the key, and he doubted she'd let any of his oily, tarry hands anywhere on her car but the inside of the engine and under the chassis.

“Are you sure it's fixed, darling?” Cruella asked as she slid back into the driver's seat.

He shrugged. “I'm very optimistic about it, though.”

Cruella turned the ignition, and the engine exploded.

If Horace and Jasper were terrible at routine repairs, they were even worse at emergencies. The two spent the first few moments of the blaze screaming and panicking, before they remembered he had installed a fire-extinguishing system specifically for this. They grabbed the nozzle and activated the pump, but they fought over it in a tug-of-war than holding it steady together, spraying dousing chemicals everywhere but on the fire.

And then Cruella started _screaming._

“ _ **MY BABY!**_ **WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY PRECIOUS BABY?!”** was all he heard before the rest turned into incoherent screeching. 

He watched as the woman he had known as the radiant queen amidst the gloom and depression, the woman he had shared a bed with for so long, the woman who could in the space of a few seconds charm, wile, and have him completely wrapped around her finger turned into what she really was:

A demon from hell, a harpy with long, gangly limbs, horrific claws, and a screech that shattered his ear drums, caused him unimaginable suffering like never before, before it echoed deep inside his mind long after he had fled from that forsaken place.

Cruella never called again, and he was happy fo rit. From the way pretty much all of his inventions and machines for her made its way to the scrap heap or back to him, it seemed she wanted nothing to do with him, either. 

People were keen on gossiping and asking him questions about the “real” story of the latest hot gossip now circulating all over the Isle of the Lost, but he never paid much attention to them, nor gave them any answers.

He did know the most popular version, though: In their tug of war, Horace and Jasper accidentally let go of the hose and it went completely out of control, whipping right over to Cruella and coating her head to toe in its chemical load, ruining her dress and one of her favourite fur coats, before it slammed into the hood, let loose a violent blast as the nozzle finally gave, and completely extinguished the blaze, letting the car make it out of the chaos just fine.

Then Cruella screamed like never before, a screech they said the entire Isle heard.

* * *

He stopped going out on excursions to bars, marketplaces, and popular public hang-outs, mostly staying at home or scavenging for parts, always on the lookout for anything painted ruby red or anyone in a fur coat of any sort. 

And for his friend's part, he shut up about Cruella and women in general.

That is until one day, he found his security system once more outwitted and disabled, and his friend hanging out on that same window, the bars sawed off.

“Did you know Cruella's pregnant?” His friend asked.

He stopped. “No, I did not.”

There was an awkward silence for a few moments.

“Well…?” His friend asked.

“Well what?” He replied.

“Aren't you going to do anything about it…?”

He took a deep breath, and sighed. “What _can_ I do about it? Take the child from Cruella? And even if she somehow agreed, or I could pull that off with her storming up my house, demanding them back, do you really think that I'd be fit for fatherhood?” He gestured to his surroundings: tables, drawers, and boxes filled to the brim with broken or worn tools, small metal bits, and prototype machines that could easily toyed with or swallowed by curious young children, with deadly aftermaths.

His friend opened his mouth, before he closed it. That was the end of all talk about his child. 

He was no monster—he felt sorry that any human being would have to live with Cruella, much less be born, raised, and dependent on her, but there really was nothing he could do but continue on with his life, and wish them luck, wherever they were.

Eventually he forgot all about them. He was almost constantly busy as demand for his services actually _increased_ since the incident—it was a good sign when his work could survive getting set on fire, it seems; Cruella had become an almost total recluse, rarely leaving the safety of her home; and no one even knew what became of the child, not even if it lived or died.

Besides, children born to cruel, malicious, or just plain incompetent parents started becoming the norm on the Isle of the Lost.

It would be many, many, many years before the subject came up again. Even then, he didn't even realize that it had.

All he knew was that for King Benjamin's latest decree, Auradon would start letting people out of the Isle of the Lost on work visas, giving them a chance to put their brute strength, cunning, and smarts for good in exchange for a stay in Auradon—hopefully, for the rest of their lives.

The particular ad he answered called for engineers and scientists, especially ones who had continued to work and invent with the limited supplies and lack of proper tools on the Isle of the Lost. The qualification was being able to submit a working blueprint, prototype, or viable solution for inventions and issues that were confounding some Auradonian inventor or organization.

He had assumed at first that the blueprint he chose specifically described salvaged parts and jury-rigged contraptions for his convenience, but as he started studying the details and the notes, he couldn't help but feel a strange niggling at the back of his head, like these weren't some stranger's blueprints, that he had drafted them sometime ago and forgot that he had ever did them.

A thought flashed through his mind. “Could it be…?” He muttered.

Then he shook his head. Why waste time wondering about it here on the Isle of the Lost, when he could have been doing that in Auradon? 


End file.
